u/Already_Infamous

At the age of...

18: Worked 8 months part time at a pizza shop

19: Worked door to door sales for 6 months

20: Enrolled in college for Business Administration

21: Dropped out of college — got sick of the networking entrepreneur crowd

22: Went to real estate school and very disliked it… So I didn't pursue a career in that field

23: Got a car salesman job, was great at it even though it required extensive masking, but I despised the company and culture — It was mostly Wolf of Wall Street wannabees

24-26: Started up a SMMA online business…

Became overall disintered by that industry and it was mostly a failure, barely made enough money to cover food costs.

27-28: Lost everything, went bankrupt…

Started over again working in a warehouse moving boxes around

But, strangely enough, this was actually the easiest mental job I've ever had. Although, the environment was terrible.

29: Got burned out, wanted to take a gap year with the little savings I had

30: Lost everything again, got sick from mold poisoning and the transmission blew out in my vehicle. Moved back home. Can't land a job. Feeling hopeless.

Now, I'm about to turn 31 — realizing I've achieved next to nothing. Even though I've dabbled around in a lot of different things, I don't really have any work experience that society values.

And my other realization is worse, because even if I find something that better fits my temperament, I know it won't last for long… Given, as soon as job routine and coworker relationship managing kicks in - I get extremely depressed and depleted. Then, I end up running away again and starting something else.

I can't seem to break this dreadful pattern.

There have been so many occasions when I'm getting ready to leave the house and I say to myself:

“I'm just going to relax and try to speak normally without being paranoid and constantly scanning the room” … but that never seems to work, because as soon as I enter a setting with other people — the protective program of my speaking mannerisms kicks in and I start talking away from people, acting distant, steering clear from eye contact, etc...

It's almost like a knee jerk reaction that I no longer have consciously control over. Seems like it's ingrained into my psyche that I must operate with certain behaviors in order to, at best, minimize the reactions of BB.

I've heard some people whom developed care free attitudes and mental resilience when recognizing people's reactions (maybe they operate inside environments where they're forced to talk a lot and just become numb to the reactions?)

What has been your experience with this?

Personally, I have not reached this level of indifference yet.